'She is—and does credit to my taste, Deb.'
'One whom it is impossible to dislike, I admit.'
'Of course.'
'And also quite impossible to love.'
'Oh, come now, poor Annot!' said Hawkey, with a kind of mock deprecation; and then to gain favour he said, 'I do wish, dear Deb, that you would see the doctor again—about yourself.'
'I have seen him; the old story, he can do nothing but order me to avoid all agitation, yet you have not given me much chance of that lately.'
'But just once again, Deb—about this money——'
'Another word on the subject and we part for ever!' she exclaimed, and giving him a glance—stony as the stare of Medusa—one such as he had never before seen in her small, keen, and steely-gray eyes, she flung away and left him.
He gnashed his teeth, smashed his pipe on the floor, then lit a huge regalia to soothe his susceptibilities, and thought about how the money was to be raised. He knew his sister had thousands idle in the bank, and have it he should at all hazards!
He had meant, too, if successful, and he found her pliable, to have spoken to her again about making her will; but certainly the present did not seem a favourable occasion to do so.